<!DOCTYPE html>
<html>
<head>
<meta charset="UTF-8">
<title>A Crawling Sensation by Nines35711</title>
<style type="text/css">

body { background-color: #ffffff; }
.CI {
text-align:center;
margin-top:0px;
margin-bottom:0px;
padding:0px;
}
.center   {text-align: center;}
.cover    {text-align: center;}
.full     {width: 100%; }
.quarter  {width: 25%; }
.smcap    {font-variant: small-caps;}
.u        {text-decoration: underline;}
.bold     {font-weight: bold;}
</style>
</head>
<body>
<h1><a href="https://archiveofourown.org/works/25476439">A Crawling Sensation</a> by <a class='authorlink' href='https://archiveofourown.org/users/Nines35711/pseuds/Nines35711'>Nines35711</a></h1>

<table class="full">

<tr><td><b>Category:</b></td><td>Original Work</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Genre:</b></td><td>Blood and Gore, Bugs &amp; Insects, Graphic Description, Hallucinations, Knives, Maggots, Scratching, Self-Mutilation, Vermiphobia, Violence, Violent Thoughts</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Language:</b></td><td>English</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Status:</b></td><td>Completed</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Published:</b></td><td>2020-07-24</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Updated:</b></td><td>2020-07-24</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Packaged:</b></td><td>2021-05-05 12:15:52</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Rating:</b></td><td>Mature</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Warnings:</b></td><td>Graphic Depictions Of Violence</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Chapters:</b></td><td>1</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Words:</b></td><td>1,532</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Publisher:</b></td><td>archiveofourown.org</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Story URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/works/25476439</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Author URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/users/Nines35711/pseuds/Nines35711</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Summary:</b></td><td><div class="userstuff">
              <p>Ellis wanted nothing more than to tear his skin off if only to stop the maggots from gorging themselves on his flesh.</p>
            </div></td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Comments:</b></td><td>2</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Kudos:</b></td><td>3</td></tr>

</table>

<a name="section0001"><h2>A Crawling Sensation</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Author's Note:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
      <p>TW // This involves maggots, cutting and stabbing skin, descriptions of things burrowing under skin, and self-mutilation. A character in the story is mentally unwell and uses a pen and knife to mutilate himself. Please don't read this if any of this is not shit you're okay with reading.</p>
    </blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>
  <span>Every minor scratch, every pinprick against his back and brush against his arm had him clawing at his skin. He couldn’t help it. Alistair had left town to visit family and it was so hard to remember to take care of his dishes. Ellis often forgot about the half-eaten food he’d left out on his desk or dinner table until it started to rot. The curse of an author, he called it. That was why he had Alistair to help him most of the time.</span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>This time, he’d perhaps left a pie out too long. When he came across it two weeks later, he’d found flies buzzing around it eagerly. Nestled in the filling were squirming, writhing </span>
  <em>
    <span>maggots</span>
  </em>
  <span>. It wasn’t the smell that had him emptying his stomach, but the sight of the ugly creatures feasting on his leftovers. His skin started to crawl.</span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>Ellis was ashamed to admit he fled, leaving the plate to fester further. He couldn’t bear to touch the plate lest the maggots find him a more interesting meal. He figured it wouldn’t be too big of a deal to leave it for another few days until Alistair could come and clean it up. That was a mistake.</span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>As he went to sleep that night, Ellis felt a prickle on his shoulder. He shot up off the mattress and reached behind him. On his bed was a feather, just down from his pillow. He picked it up to inspect it. Just a normal feather. He could have sworn he felt it move when he laid down. He flicked it onto the floor and got comfortable again. Despite having nothing underneath him, though, he couldn’t help but feel the prick of the feather again. His skin itched terribly. He twisted around and dug his nails into his shoulder until the itch finally went away. His mind unhelpfully conjured an image of the pie, fat with maggots. He ignored it and slept.</span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>His back crawled when he woke up. He scrambled off the bed, falling onto the floor with a groan. Ellis stood and looked at his bed. There was nothing there. He sighed, repeating that to himself in his head. </span>
  <em>
    <span>There’s nothing there. There’s nothing there.</span>
  </em>
  <span> He couldn’t help the thoughts of things burrowing into him. Worms digging their tunnels through his skin and eating at him. He shuddered and hurried to get dressed.</span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>After the rough wake-up, he felt too sick to bother making breakfast, so he walked straight to his study. He kept his eyes down to avoid the sight of the plate as he went through the living room.</span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>Ellis sat at his desk for hours, unable to come up with anything. His book was falling behind and he knew it, but it was so hard to write, especially with the current thoughts plaguing his mind. He wished desperately for Alistair to come home early. His knee itched for just a moment and it had him yanking his pants down to scratch furiously at it. It was only when he had satisfied the itch that he realized how he looked. He flushed, glad for once that Alistair wasn’t there to walk in on him.</span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>The day continued like this. He would feel a minor tickle on his skin and tear at his clothes to get rid of it. He ended up removing his shirt for the rest of the day. Every time he felt the smallest brush his mind screamed at him that it was a maggot trying to dig under his skin.</span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>He didn’t eat at all, instead opting to ignore the pangs of hunger in his stomach while he hid in his study. He would need to go through the dining room again to get to the kitchen and the thought terrified him.</span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>Ellis was red by the end of the day. His skin was covered in red lines from where he had dug at his skin trying to ease the sensation of something crawling just beneath the surface. He wanted to sleep but when he thought of the plate and its occupants, he decided he’d rather stay in his study for the night. Maybe Alistair would be back by tomorrow afternoon and he could rid himself of this mess.</span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>He ended up hunched over his desk half-asleep despite his body’s need for food. He was so tired, but he was kept awake worrying about something crawling under his door. The door had a small crack under it. It never seemed like much before, besides something that let a draft in. Now he realized that it was perfectly sized for something long and thin to wriggle its way underneath. The instant this occurred to him he was out of his chair and running for the windows. Ellis tore the curtains off one window and shoved it under the door. They wouldn’t be able to get through that, he was sure of it. The eventual cost to replace the ruined curtains was nothing for how much safer he felt.</span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>Nothing could get him now. He was safe. He was… itchy. It started at the small of his back and climbed up to his shoulders, a barely-there presence that had him shrieking. He clawed at his skin, certain he could feel something underneath, but there was nothing when he felt the area.</span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>Ellis whimpered. He was too late in blocking the door. One of them had gotten in and now it was tormenting him and he could do nothing but writhe around like a fool trying to catch it. His eyes landed on the pen that sat unused on his desk. He grabbed it and held it in a white-knuckle grip. When the crawling started up again, he plunged the tip into his arm. Blood dripped out of the hole, but he’d missed the maggot. He waited until it started to move again and stabbed the pen into his side this time. The wounds stung but he was too distracted by his desperation.</span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>It was there. He could feel it chewing at his flesh, gorging itself while he went insane. He needed something with more range. The pen only let him hit a small spot, but if he had, say a knife, he could cut the maggot out easily. He would need to run to the kitchen. More might dig into his feet if he ran over them, but if he had a knife he could get them out anyway.</span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>He stood on shaky legs and opened the door. There was nothing in the hall, but they could be hiding from him, waiting to catch him unawares. He started running. He didn’t even glance at the plate gathering dust on the table as he sprinted for the kitchen. Something moved under his feet and he shrieked, turning the corner and forcing the kitchen door open. He shut it with a slam and stumbled towards the knife block. The first one his hand wrapped around was a wide blade. It was perfect.</span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>As soon as he felt the wriggling under his skin, Ellis dug the knife in. It burned, but as he peeled the skin from his body, he was sure he saw the little white body of a maggot. He cut the piece of skin off completely and flung it to the floor. It met the tile with a wet smack. He was bleeding more now, but he’d gotten one of the little wrigglers out of him. He’d get the rest out if it killed him.</span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>Ellis moved to his feet. The sole of his right foot tingled and without hesitation, he forced the blade into it. He squeezed his eyes shut to try and block out the pain. He needed to do this, and he couldn’t have his nerves ruining it. No amount of breathing could stop the searing pain of him slicing off the bottom of his foot. Blood was spreading across the floor rapidly.</span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>There, in the thick flesh that fell to the floor, he could see them. Several maggots all feasting eagerly on his severed skin. What if they tried to get into his other foot? He pushed the blade under the skin of his left foot. They had… Ellis was going to be sick. Some of them had already managed to burrow under the hard pad of his foot. He was starting to get lightheaded. In the back of his mind, a nagging warning told him he had cut too much. But, how could he quit knowing that there were more of them, eating him from the inside out? They wriggled in his belly and dug tunnels through his muscle.</span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>Ellis skinned himself alive, watching in horror as more and more of the maggots fell from his body, freed by the blade. He couldn’t stop, slicing bit by bit until he was soaked in his own blood. His breathing slowed. When he looked over the shredded flesh, he didn’t see any more maggots. They were gone.</span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>Satisfied, his eyes slid closed and he slumped over. He was clean and there were no more maggots trying to get at him. He hardly noticed the worried shouts of Alistair as he fell asleep.</span>
</p>
  </div><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_foot_notes"><b>Author's Note:</b><blockquote class="userstuff"><p>Yeah, maggots fucking suck. I see them sometimes at work because we tend to pile garbage onto our truck and sometimes I want nothing more than to take a knife to my skin because they gross me out so much.</p></blockquote></div></div>
</body>
</html>